The Last Smile in Sunder City

I was only in my thirties but I was old. You don’t measure age in years, you measure it in lessons learned and repeated mistakes and how hard it is to force a little hope into your heart. Old just means jaded and cynical and tired. And boy, was I tired.

So, you’re a Man for Hire?” “That’s right.” “Why don’t you just call yourself a detective?” “I was worried that might make me sound intelligent.

I like books. They’re quiet, dignified and absolute. A man might falter but his words, once written, will hold.

It was like walking into someone’s bedroom right after their funeral. It was the first Monday you didn’t have to go to school and knew there were some friends you’d just never see again. It was sitting in a bar in a bad town where no one knew your name and there was no one to talk to and it was too cold and quiet and you were all alone. It was thinking you’d already hit the last step till your leg slips through the empty air and every bit of your body tells you that it’s over.

Then, there’s friendship. I get the idea, of course, but it looks different when other people do it. They seem at ease with each other, while I always feel like a tourist. During my first year in Sunder City, I thought people spent time with me as some sort of charity. I wasn’t witty or insightful or especially interesting, so I thought they only kept me around to be nice.

A good man is made through a lifetime of work. Great men are made by their monsters.

I've got nothing left to lose. No friends. No money. Nobody to disappoint. All I have is the perfect cup of coffee. So, for now, I'll drink the coffee.

It was over. The world will continue to turn and there will still be jobs and seasons and kissing and chocolate; there just won’t be any music in it any more. We can bite the fruit and understand that it is sweet but not taste it.

Love? Who the hell knows? Does anyone really understand that one? There are a million poets around the world right now still trying to crack that code.

I searched through all my belongings for a good book to escape into. I needed to spend some time in a mind that wasn’t my own.

We all fear the other, and if we ever make friends with our enemy, the first thing we do as allies is identify some new foe.

Rather than waste their days wrestling with the truth, it was better to get on with life and trust the lies.

I felt like two hundred pounds of foolishness but I’d done what I’d wanted to: stir up some shit to see what comes sniffing.

I know what it's like to try and be better. To set yourself a code to live by and to think that maybe you've succeeded. I also know what it's like to have temptation waved in front of your face. To be tested. And to fail.

She said the same amount of nothing she’d said every time I’d gone by.

Instead I ask myself - what do people always need?" He straightened himself up and smiled with perfect teeth. "Breakfast!

I don’t know how they can. This is all new to them isn’t it. No, for them, this broken world will be the good stuff. I can’t imagine it’s not going to get worse by the time they’re as old as we are. Maybe by then we’ll all look back on today and wish we knew how good we had it.

This body, once contained the strongest spirit the world ever know. Now, a tap could shatter it to pieces.

I’d been so deep in my self-loathing I thought everyone just hated me. I was wrong. Everyone hated everyone.

The blinds were thin and blue. The floor was marble, or maybe it was fake. The whole damned place was trying to pull a ruse. The lampshades were lying and the desk was a cheater and I bet the leather armchair had been trained to pick your pocket.

Or, it could be that I just have one of those faces people dream about pushing into a beehive.

On that night when we invaded the mountain and started the end of everything, I took a mean hit to the heart from the woman at the top.

I swung my left arm out at him; I never was much good with it. I telegraphed it so bad that he'd heard rumors of it three weeks earlier.

So, I opened the Angel door. The one that led out to nothing but a patch of empty air. It had been useful when there was magic in the world and folks took to the skies like it was nothing. Now it was only handy if you wanted to kiss the cobblestones at fifty miles an hour.

No one had cheated them of their youth. They’d spent it of their own accord and the creases in their skin and creaking of their bones had arrived right on schedule. When Father Time knocked on their door, they might not have greeted him with open arms but at least they’d known he was coming.

She saw me approach and smiled with lips you could throw to a drowning sailor.